The American Chemical Society (ACS) has announced the winners of its 2026 Green Chemistry Challenge Awards, recognising pioneering work across pharmaceuticals, materials science, agriculture, and semiconductor manufacturing.
ACS says the awards “recognize outstanding work in recyclable polyurethanes, cleaner pharmaceutical manufacturing, sustainable crop protection, biodegradable polymers, PFAS-free semiconductor cooling and biocide-free marine coatings.”
The society notes that these innovations “reduce or eliminate hazardous substances, cut waste and advance environmental responsibility across industries,” reflecting growing urgency around industrial sustainability.
In the academic category, Professor William R. Dichtel of Northwestern University and Dr. Alaaeddin Alsbaiee of BASF Corporation are recognised for a solid-state recycling platform that upcycles polyurethane foams and elastomers without depolymerisation, solvents, or toxic catalysts.
The Northwestern-BASF process uses low-toxicity metal and organic catalysts to activate carbamate exchange within polyurethane networks, converting materials typically considered non-recyclable into covalent adaptable networks during processing.
NewAmsterdam Pharma and Snapdragon Chemistry have been honoured for developing an organocatalyzed asymmetric Povarov cyclization to manufacture the chiral tetrahydroquinoline core of obicetrapib, a late-stage cholesteryl ester transfer protein inhibitor targeting dyslipidemia.
The condition affects tens of millions of Americans who do not reach target low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels with existing therapies, making a cleaner manufacturing route for obicetrapib particularly significant.
Corteva Agriscience has secured two awards this year, first for its Adavelt active fungicide, which controls 20 diseases across more than 30 crops using an improved process that eliminated three protecting groups, four steps, and precious metals.
Corteva also won recognition for Utrisha N, a biological nutrient efficiency optimizer using a living foliar endophyte, Methylobacterium symbioticum SB23, whose second-generation manufacturing process cuts energy and water requirements while maintaining an identical final formulation.
IFF received an award for its Designed Enzymatic Biomaterials platform, which produces renewable and biodegradable polymers through precision enzyme-catalyzed polymerization under mild conditions, matching the performance of fossil-based materials while enabling circular end-of-life pathways.
Standard H2 was recognised for the SULFUR MAGNET, a regenerable filter media made primarily of mixed oxides of copper and other metals that efficiently removes sulfur to enable cost-effective purification of feed streams for fuel cell applications.
PPG won for SIGMAGLIDE 2390, a biocide-free silicone-based fouling-release coating featuring HydroReset Technology, which reorganises the coating surface at the nanoscale so marine organisms do not recognise it as a suitable surface for permanent attachment.
In the small business category, Algenesis Labs was recognised for Soleic, a biobased and fully biodegradable polyurethane system that replaces fossil-fuel monomers with plant-based alternatives, addressing a global polyurethane production market exceeding 25 million metric tons annually.
Micron received the climate change award for replacing PFAS-based heat transfer fluids in semiconductor dry etch chambers with a fully fluorine-free, biodegradable, and low-global-warming-potential alternative, removing persistent chemicals from a critical manufacturing process.